


Budd (The Devil's Fingers' Remix)

by Sath



Category: Sunless Sea
Genre: Cannibalism, Epistolary, Gen, Horror, Remix
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-16
Updated: 2018-09-16
Packaged: 2019-07-11 16:47:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15976400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sath/pseuds/Sath
Summary: You find a cache of letters on the wreck of a ship in the Chelonate.





	Budd (The Devil's Fingers' Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tuesday](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tuesday/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Myceligaea](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5045770) by [tuesday](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tuesday/pseuds/tuesday). 



My dear Iphigenia,

We have scarcely left the lights on London behind, yet I am already secluded in my cabin so that I may write to you. I am extremely fortunate to be a third mate under Captain Donner. We had no deserters while ashore, and lost so few crew in our last journey that we have taken on only one new crewman. He is completely inexperienced, and wide-eyed as I was when I first zailed the Zee! Naturally, he starts at nothing; even the captain’s bat is too much for his sensibilities, and we all know that Queen Victoria IV barely even hurts flies.

I do think that the captain is sometimes too kind. Budd (our recruit) is allergic to all but the blandest food. He doesn’t eat with us, and instead gets to eat his special diet in the captain’s (!) cabin, personally prepared by the cook. The man claims that he’d rather eat hardtack and canned rat with the rest of us, but there’s something unconvincing in his manner. Is he someone of secret importance? The captain does not defer to him in any way. In fact, the captain looks at him oddly, as he might inspect one of our stranger catches.

Regardless, if that b— is eating better than I am, I will be very put out.

* * *

 My dear Iphiginia,

I am writing to you with the smell of ash from Mount Palmerston still scenting my hair with brimstone. Unlike some zailors, I have no interest in the doings of devils. We have enough of them in London! And, I suppose, I don’t want to end up like old Uncle Flagellus. Remember when we saw Flagellus’s soul in that pawn shop? I do think that you were right about how we could not spare the expense.

Budd is very sick. At first, he merely stank. The Zee has many strange emanations, the zailor being among the foulest, but Budd’s stink was more like mold. The rest of us hinted that he ought to change his clothes, and we even lent him some of ours, but the stink was in Budd, and not his clothing, so we have had to hold our noses.

His latest development is gills behind his ears. When I suggested that it could be a consequence of his diet, Budd started laughing like a madman, then went into a coughing fit where he started choking up dust. Please don’t be worried, though—I did not let him get near me. 

* * *

 My dear Miphigenia,

We have let Budd off at Whither. At least, that is what we were told. For the past few weeks, Budd had been confined to the brig, and no one was allowed to go see him. Not that we wanted to, given Budd’s unnatural state, but it was all highly suspicious.

Poor Budd’s imprisonment began after he ran screaming from the captain’s cabin, chanting his own name: “Budd! Budd! I’m Budding!” We made a game attempt at keeping him from jumping overboard without touching him, though he did cough dust on the bo’sun. All of us were very concerned that whatever Budd had, it was contagious, and though no one said it, we suspected Budd’s food of bringing about his state. The crew became quite heated, until the doctor gave us an impromptu magic show. His scarf trick is incredible! Shame he won’t tell anyone how he does it.

I suspect that Budd never left the ship at all. The captain’s manner has begun to disturb me. Where I once thought him mild, I think now that he is cold. It is not a captain’s job to be warm, but I do prefer a captain who has at least some feelings. If Budd has come to a bad end, the cook and the doctor must also be co-conspirators:

They are certainly co-conspirators in keeping all the meat and mushroom stew to themselves! 

* * *

My dear Mycagenia,

I will begin by apologizing for returning to Zee, after you begged me not to go back to Captain Donner. But I was told that I have no small chance of advancement; the second mate is nearing retirement, and he favors me for his successor. It is just one more voyage!

Yet again, we have a new crewmate. The captain has informed us that we shouldn’t worry about what happened to Budd, and to prove it, the recruit, a woman named Hypha, has offered to eat the same restricted diet as Budd. While the others were willing to believe the captain, the bo’sun and I do not. He has had a terrible cough ever since he held Budd back from the water, and he’s starting to smell of mold. We are all very concerned, as the bo’sun is a favorite of the crew. 

I left an anonymous note for Hypha in her hammock, warning her of the captain’s schemes and offering to trade her safety for information. So far, Hypha has not made any effort to reply. Can she not see through the captain’s pleasant façade? There is something behind his eyes that frightens me.  

* * *

My dear Myceligaea,

I have led my first mutiny—but too late, I fear. The captain’s hunger has doomed us all.

The end began with the death of the bo’sun. After many days of sickening like Budd, madness set in. But there was no one quick enough to wrench the bo’sun back from throwing himself into the Zee. He left a cloud of dust on the deck in his wake. Now, I realize all too late that it was not dust, but spores.

The crew and I wanted answers. We seized Hypha, who smelled of mold, who had gills growing along her jaw and by her wrists, and demanded that the captain come out and confess to whatever he was doing to her, and what was being passed to us. When he refused, we broke into his cabin and threw him into the brig where Budd had spent his last days.

D— the captain! I have read his diary. He _ate_ Budd in the stew! But he did not count on the spores working like the diet. Oh, it’s working slower in us, but my thoughts turn… vegetable. I dream of rotten things, and all of us feel as if we are living in a fog. Sometimes hours pass before we realize we've been standing in place, and just yesterday the second mate went to sleep and never woke up. He is part of his cabin now. 

We are drifting towards the Uttershroom. I can only hope that this letter reaches you somehow. 

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to Gileonnen for the beta!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[podfic] Budd (The Devil's Fingers' Remix)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16219274) by [KeeperofSeeds](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KeeperofSeeds/pseuds/KeeperofSeeds)




End file.
